Holiday Shoppers Give Local Service Workers A Run For The Money

December 23, 1990|by RON DEVLIN, The Morning Call

At Bob's Bakery, they have a big Christmas party -- after Christmas.

Before Christmas, when corks are popping in some workplaces in the region, the people at Bob's are so busy baking and selling gingerbread Santas and Christmas-tree cakes that there's no time to celebrate the holiday.

Even if there was, they're so burned out from trying to keep up with the demand for Christmas cookies and other baked goods that a party just wouldn't be much fun.

"Everybody's much too tired to have a party before Christmas," said Judy Luengen, who runs the Crest Plaza bake shop with her husband, Ernie. "So, we wait until after the holiday and have a big one."

By most accounts, this will not be one of the busiest Christmases ever. In hushed tones, some managers and owners concede they've seen better holiday seasons.

But at places like Bob's Bakery, where customers were lined up to the door yesterday morning, the Christmas rush is on.

With just two shopping days remaining before C-day, consumers are jamming supermarkets, state stores and shopping malls in a last-minute attempt to stock the pantry and find that special gift for a special someone.

At local State Stores, for example, they're buying the bubbly as if there's no tomorrow. That might be understandable with the economy in a downturn and more than a half-million troops staring down a gun barrel in the Persian Gulf.

But there's a much more practical reason for stocking up on the hard stuff -- the price is going up on Jan. 1.

At the state's Wine & Spirits Shoppe in South Whitehall Township, where the line was back to the Bolla Chardonnay, they were filling shopping carts with Chivas Regal, Canadian Club and Crown Royal.

"They're buying anything that's gift-wrapped," said Jerry Gallucci, the manager. "And of course, with New Year's Eve in mind, champagne."

DELI ROLLS IN HOLIDAY ORDERS

At the 19th Street Deli, the orders for party trays were plastered all over the wall by the kitchen telephone. For several weeks, the deli staff has been working overtime rolling roast beef, cutting Swiss cheese into chunks and making finger sandwiches for office parties and household gatherings in West Allentown.

Eddie Kunkle, the chef and owner, said the party tray business keeps the staff hopping during the holidays.

"Party trays account for about 50 percent of our business," he said, flipping a Reuben sandwich on the grill.

POSTAL CENTERS PEAK

They may be busy at the deli, but it's hard to imagine anybody busier than the U.S. Postal Service. The regional postal centers in the Lehigh Valley handle millions of pieces of mail a day during the Christmas rush.

Fred Mager, the Lehigh Valley Post Office superintendent, said this season's peak came last Monday when 4 million pieces of mail were processed at the regional center near the Allentown-Bethlehem- Easton Airport.

"Until then, we were running about 3 percent under normal," said Mager. "Now, the volume is about the same as last year."

Mager said some new automated equipment made it possible to process such a high volume of mail in a single day. But the postal center also hired 75 part-time workers for December. The superintendent said the part-timers are mostly college students and retirees.

What the post office doesn't handle, private carriers such as United Parcel Service do.

UPS spokeswoman Patricia Steffen said this year was the company's largest holiday season yet, with an estimated 307 million packages expected to be delivered across the country between Thanksgiving and Christmas. That's about $20 billion worth of goods.

Steffen said the volume peaks the week before Christmas at about 21 million packages a day -- twice the normal volume.

Steve Shipe, who manages the UPS facility in Lehigh Valley Industrial Park 4 in Bethlehem Township, said he has about 30 more drivers on the road and 50 additional workers at the warehouse during the holidays.

Shipe said catalog sales account for a large part of the volume, which begins increasing around Thanksgiving. In the final days before the holiday, most of the deliveries are gifts from friends and relatives in various parts of the country.

For UPS drivers like Ed Kovalchik, it all translates into as many as 100 more deliveries a day.

"Land's End, L.L. Bean, Sears, J.C. Penney and Lord & Taylor, we get 'em all," Kovalchik said on Friday after making a delivery in Allentown. "We also get a lot of cheese, canned hams and Omaha steaks packed in dry ice."

SANTA'S PART-TIME HELP

Gif Sander could take it easy at Christmas. Now that he's retired from Finance America, he no longer needs to worry about providing people with the money they need to make it through the holidays.

But instead of sitting at home, Sander has a busy schedule in the few weeks before Christmas -- he's Santa Claus. In Allentown spots as diverse as First Step Day Care and American Drycleaners, Sander listens as kids tell him what they want for Christmas. He also tolerates an occasional jerk or two of his cotton-like beard.